On Sunday, a Syrian government fighter jet was shot down by a U.S. aircraft hours after Syrian forces bombed U.S.-backed fighters in a village southwest of Raqqa, the Pentagon said. This was the first time a U.S. jet downed a manned hostile aircraft in more than 10 years, The Washington Post reports, and the fourth time in a month that the U.S. military attacked Syrian loyalist forces. In a statement, the Syrian military said the jet was carrying out a mission against the Islamic State, and its pilot was killed. On Monday, Russia, which supports Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces, responded by declaring it would treat U.S.-led coalition aircrafts that crossed west of the Euphrates River as targets.

Late Sunday, after President Trump fired off several weekend tweets attacking Special Counsel Robert Mueller by name, Trump lawyer Ty Cobb said that, "in response to media speculation and related questions being posed to the administration, the White House yet again confirms that the president is not considering or discussing the firing of the special counsel, Robert Mueller." On Saturday, another Trump lawyer, John Dowd, had said it was time for Mueller to end his "manufactured" investigation. A handful of Republicans warned Sunday that firing Mueller would cross a red line, and Democrats pushed for passage of stalled bipartisan legislation to protect Mueller and his investigation from political interference and Trump's wrath.

On Sunday night, an explosion injured two men in their 20s in southwest Austin. In short press briefings Sunday night and early Monday, Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said police are "working under the belief that this is related to the other bombing incidents" on March 2 and March 12 in eastern and northern Austin that killed two people and wounded a third. The two people injured on Sunday night suffered "significant" but apparently "non-life-threatening" injuries, he added, and it's possible that a trip wire set off the suspected bomb. All Austin residents were warned to steer clear of suspicious packages and call 911. Earlier Sunday, Manley raised the reward for information leading to the arrest of the bomber to $115,000.

Russia's Central Election Commission said Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin won re-election with 76.67 percent of the vote in a field of eight candidates. That was a record-high number for Putin, who won his third term in 2012 with 63.3 percent. In second place was communist Pavel Grudinin, with 11.78 percent, followed by Vladimir Zhirinovsky (5.66 percent) and TV personality Ksenia Sobchak (1.68 percent), the only of the candidates to openly criticize Putin. The candidate most likely to do well against Putin, Alexei Navalny, was barred from running because of a questionable disqualifying conviction. Election observers reported widespread ballot stuffing and unusually intense pressure on voters to participate in the election.

Three people who have spoken with Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team or congressional committees investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election told Reuters that during their interviews, they contradicted the testimony of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who last November told the House Judiciary Committee he "pushed back" against a proposal in 2016 to have Trump campaign representatives meet with Russians. The three witnesses were at a March 2016 meeting, where former Trump campaign adviser George Papadopoulos suggested the meeting, and while their accounts differed slightly, all said Sessions had no objections to Papadopoulos' idea. At the time, Sessions was still a Republican senator from Alabama, and was chairing the meeting as head of the campaign's foreign policy team.

Florida State knocked No. 1 seed Xavier out of the NCAA men's basketball tournament on Sunday night, and for the first time since 2004, only two No. 1 seeds are advancing to the Sweet 16 round. In the East Region, No. 5 seed West Virginia will face Villanova and second-seeded Purdue will battle No. 3 seed Texas Tech. In the West, third-seeded Michigan will face No. 7 seed Texas A&M and No. 4 seed Gonzaga will battle Florida State. In the Midwest, No. 1 seed Kansas will play fifth-seeded Clemson and No. 2 seed Duke will face No. 11 seed Syracuse. In the South, No. 5 seed Kentucky will take on No. 9 seed Kansas State and seventh-seeded Nevada will battle No. 11 seed Loyola-Chicago. This is the first time in tournament history that any region isn't sending any of its top four seeds to the Sweet 16.